We Don’t need no stinkin’ Country… We’ve Got: The Beaumonts!

The Beaumonts

Where Do You Want It

Saustex Media, 2013

Review by Kent Manthie

 

    On this second of CDs by a quintet from Lubbock, Texas’s, The Beaumonts, entitled Where Do You Want It we get a follow-up from their debut as The Beaumonts “continue to right the wrongs of the recent musical past…” (from the promo bio sheet).

The Beaumonts are a curiosity, indeed.  Before I hit “play” on my CD player I thought for sure that I was going to have a disc that I could rip on, since I’ve had so many CDs that have been from “mediocre-OK” to “WOW” that I haven’t, so far, anyway, received any really shitty music.  I guess that comes from a bit of self-selection, receiving music from a few labels that have great rosters of bands which, for the most part, are pleasing.  And the other thing is that I’ve gotten a lot of DIY homemade super lo fi stuff that is the epitome of cognitive dissonance, with a lot of “bent circuitry, homemade noise devices and well…just about everything but the kitchen sink.  Since I know that it’s such an easy target – too easy to just dismiss and say it’s nothing but noise and (sounding like someone’s old dad) “my five-year old kid could do better…” (you hear that a lot with so-called “modern art”-to me art’s art:  ars gratia artis.  You know.

But, I digress…when I listened to the first cut on Where Do You Want It, “I Like Drinking”, I was laughing my ass off – “I like to drink/I like dance/I like to get high”  – that being the chorus.  Then, the second cut, “I Like Women” was equally humorous.  Then there’s the laugh-out-loud “(If You Don’t) Love the Lord” which is a scream – “If you don’t love the lord, you’re fuckin’ fucked…” (2x) and then “If you don’t love the lord you’re fuckin’ fucked, just like a whore…” – goddamn that is funny!!!

At first glance The Beaumonts seem like a total Country & Western band and, well, maybe they are, in a twisted, crazy-funny way, but they are unlike any country outfit I’ve heard – especially the corn-syrup crap that you hear when you are stuck somewhere where they’re playing a country radio station or album, etc., like a convenience store/gas station or whatever… you stand in line and this awful, twangy, rhythm-impaired white-bread bumpkin junk with the dumbest lyrics you could ever think of (or worse, depends on your imagination) splatter over the rest of it and if you don’t get out of there soon you start feeling nauseated and want to vomit.

At least the Beaumonts aren’t so syrupy and have some damn funny lyrics to boot.  It’s hard to tell if they’re a total parody or if they really are country but want to present their twisted sense of humor and off-the-wall way of looking at life in this format.  Of course, the setting is just perfect – and Country Music is essential for the lyrics, the style as well as the mise en scene.

Where Do You Want It is just screamingly funny – funny in a way that the hardcore/punk band FEAR’s debut, The Record was.  I just can’t imagine how crazy a live show would be by The Beaumonts.  Whatever you do, though, make sure you get familiar with them and check out this album.  It will put Country in a whole new light for you (though, all these Country idiot right-wing nuts who sing about how great living in America is and what a great guy George W. Bush is and all this stupid propaganda that Dick Cheney just laughs his head off over when he’s alone at home.

The Beaumonts may not be taken seriously by some – there are some die-hards out there who think that calling a spade a spade is giving country a bad name – WHAT?  So, why does humor have to make a good band seem silly or like some sort of novelty act?  That was proven to be way off base – if you can remember Frank Zappa, for one thing – Zappa was hilarious!   On everything from his & the Mothers first albums:  Freak Out, Absolutely Free, We’re Only In It For the Money, Weasels Ripped My Flesh, to his solo stuff, Hot Rats, the mostly instrumental Grand Wazoo, to his revolving door-bands of the mid-late 70s with their classics:  Zoot Allures, Sheik Yerbouti, Joe’s Garage among lots of others.  Zappa was not only a satirical, laugh-out-loud humorist, but he was a genius musical virtuoso, who was not only a fiery guitarist who left one with dropped jaw and a state of shock after one of his mind-blowing LOUD solos, he was also a multi-instrumentalist, a genuine composer, rather than just a songwriter, writing and arranging the music for all the myriad parts of his extensive ensembles and, of course he was a fiercely perfectionist producer, knowing which little details needed to be changed and which ones worked, etc.  Zappa is and will always be a legend, one that cannot ever be duplicated – and since album one, humor has been his main lyrical point, although, between the guffaws and the lewd jokes of “Dinah-Moe Humm”, “Didja Get Any Onya?” as well as “Who Are the Brain Police?”, he had some social commentary to slip in, a la “Trouble Everyday”, on his Mothers debut, Freak Out, a certified classic.

Anyway, the point is, you don’t have to be a right-wing shill, pretending that America is this great “shining city on a hill” or something and some other over the top poetic bullshit – the US is a money-hungry, war-machine that cares little about social justice.  Sure, there are lots of individuals that can claim that mantle – both elected officials and hard-working activists, etc, but as far as the governments policies – domestic and foreign – we are a bully to the rest of the world and when we give in to the Republicans, bad things happen – spending cuts are made, the kind that screw the poor, the needy, the hungry and the homeless – but does the GOP ever consider cutting defense spending?  The wasteful, ever-skyrocketing budget for defense?  HELL NO!  That is a sacred cow that no Republican would even dare mention (kind of like “I support Israel 100% no matter how much they abuse the Palestinians and break international law, which is just a joke anyway to Washington-because, as we saw with Chuck Hagel, who had the balls to stand up to the AIPAC parasites, he was vilified and smeared by strategic missiles aimed at derailing his SECDEF confirmation, which, at this revision, he won, by a somewhat slim margin.

But, I digress.  I love the Beaumonts for a return to the days of Hank Williams, The Statler Brothers, Buck Owens, Georges Strait & Jones, Tammy Wynette, Loretta Lynn and of course, the man in black himself, the late, great Johnny Cash – who really knew how to craft a song that held your attention and, while full of depraved stories and liquor fueled craziness and cocaine binges, etc., was a regal figure, respected the music world over.  We need to dump the corny Garth Brooks types and Toby Keiths and Trace Adkinses and all those goofy “My country, right or wrong” types.  The kind of jerks who were anathema to the antiwar movement of the Vietnam era – which means that they liked the idea of continuing a war that was meaningless, killing Americans by the score and didn’t have any positive outcome.  Those people were just the John Birch lunatic fringe that no one would miss if they disappeared from the planet.

Anyway, The Beaumonts and their ilk these days are playing to a new generation and have a much more laid back, liquor backed frenzy of fun, fun, fun.  Life’s a gas, life is short so why take things so damn serious?  Put yer kicks on,  baby, we’re going to the bar and hear this raucous, raw band bring the house down and the roof will fall on a laughing bunch of folks.  Keep it up!  We need more like you!  And, thanks, Saustex – you are to be commended for finding these bands and getting them the exposure they deserve!!        -KM

New CHURCHWOOD!

Churchwood

Churchwood 2

Saustex Media

Reviewed by Kent Manthie

 

    Churchwood is back, this time with a new full length album, simply entitled Churchwood 2.  This Austin, TX band is a wild bunch of snake-eyed rhythm devils.  Those who remember their debut album and were wowed by it will be delighted to revel in this one.

    Their music falls somewhere in between Rev. Horton Heat, Captain Beefheart, a Texas-style Nick Cave as well as The Cramps.  Yes, that is quite a diverse crossbreed, but when you hear it, you’ll find it’s an apt description.  The 10 songs on 2 are each a treat to listen to.  The guitars are slick, sinister and intricate as well.  It’s a well-produced album too – not a murky sounding, homemade sound, but a clean, well-lit album.  The one thing about Churchwood is that singer, Joe Doerr has a singing voice that sounds a lot like Tom Waits with a Texas drawl and since Waits is nothing short of a musical god, that is high praise.

    Churchwood or, rather the parts that make up the sum have been around quite a while.  Singer Joe Doerr has been around for some time – first in the early 80s as Kid LeRoi in the Texas “roots”-music band, The LeRoi Brothers.  After that, Doerr and guitarist Bill Anderson first met up in another Austin-based band, Ballad Shambles which soon changed into Hand of Glory, which was praised by music press as being “a diverse & exciting quartet…A Strikingly potent band – mixing up cowboy rock, blues, Doorsy atmospherics and more with confidence and creativity”  Hand of Glory’s two albums on Skyclad Records are, being out of print and practically impossible to get unless you get lucky at a used record store or on Amazon.com – you never know what you can come across there, what with the giant network of independent record stores all over the US, Canada and UK too, somewhat collectible to the connoisseur.  The band broke up in 1992, just as their prescient grunge-style, laid-back rough & tumble music was getting a new life, with other influences such as Husker Du, The Melvins and early Meat Puppets as that fad called “Grunge” that eventually pretty much ruined the word “alternative” and turned it into just another commercial, corporate commodity.

    It wasn’t that long before Anderson came back to his roots – the blues, his original inspiration before branching out into a dada-esque painting of influences and styles.  Anderson was, as he said, listening to Captain Beefheart a lot at the time and that’s one thing that got him going again.  And when he was thinking of “getting the band back together” as the saying goes, he thought, once more, as Joe Doerr – his perfect vocal complement.  Next thing you know, they were tinkering around and soon found drummer and ex-bassist Julien Peterson; they found Adam Kahan to play the bass Peterson had abandoned and second guitarist Billysteve Korpi and with that a raucous powerhouse had been rounded out and worked up.

    They weren’t just a lonely band without a home long:  soon their musical stylings caught the attention of Saustex – a label also in Austin, TX, who released their self-titled debut, as well as a vinyl 7 inch a year or so later.  Their music reached further than they even expected – not only did their stuff resonate with indie music lovers who were (and many times are) starving for more,  better and new stuff.  Even the suits in L.A. somehow found them out and next thing you know, the song from their debut, “Rimbaud Didley” shows up on the F/X hit cult series, Sons of Anarchy, two seasons ago.  So you know that when your music ends up being part of a soundtrack to an episode of a hit show with a loyal, intense following, you can finally smile and say “whew” – but there’s a fine line between licensing your music to a show or movie and letting your material be pimped out for a commercial (there’s an excellent song by Primus, from their Green Naughahyde album a couple years ago that deals with that situation perfectly – HOINFORDAMAN).  Never, ever, ever give any company or ad agency permission or license to use any of your music for an ad.  That is just shameless and there’s no excuse for “ho-in’ for the man – the advertising man…”

      To acquaint you out there with a few tunes to whet your appetites – Well, the opening cut, “Duende” is a romp, one that gets your toes tapping and puts you in the right mindset.  “The Devil in Me” is a sexual innuendo that shows that the nasty is naughty and the naughty feels right.  “You Be The Mountain (I’ll Be Mohammed)” has this wah-wah guitar that is reminiscent of the soundtrack to Shaft, other 70s soul/rock but breaks into a rockin’ chorus.  Speaking as I did of Primus before, this tune here is one that uses the eclectic instrumentation that Primus uses, but without the latter’s harder-edged qualities.  “You be the mountain/I’ll be Mohammed/Come to me” is the mantra of the tune.   Then, on “Money Shot Man” has a very different texture than “You Be the Mountain”, starting out with a slowed down mellowness, then kicking up some dirt and gravel and back and forth.

    All in all, this album 2 is an excellent indication that Churchwood aren’t just a two-horse band, but that they have a barn-load of eccentricities to unload on what should be a good-sized fan base and in time turn them into the “cult” band that always has a devoted set of fans who are going to spread the gospel of the Church(wood) to the many.  Although lots won’t “get it” – but who needs ’em anyway, right?  Just as long as these cats keep true to what I’m hearing now and on the last couple releases (both the debut CD and the 7″ vinyl EP).  If you think that “indie” is getting stale -well, for one thing, you aren’t looking very hard – but also, Churchwood can fill any hole or void you’re trying to saturate.    -KM      

The Mexican-American Blues

The Copper Gamins

Los Ninos de Cobre

Saustex Media, 2012

Reviewed by Kent Manthie

 

   The Copper Gamins are keeping things going with their new CD, Los Ninos de Cobre.  It is a follow up to their debut EP from last year (2012).  They bring an authenticity with their love of the blues and they take their blues-lovin’ sounds to a primitive place where few bands dare to tread.  When I put in this CD in the player and hit play I was blown away by the kickass lo-fi/garage-rock atmosphere of it.  The first two tunes – “All Hid” and “Oh Well Well” are two examples of this beery, laconic garage band that evokes pictures in your mind of being in a smallish-sized club in a hip city somewhere – like Austin, L.A., or New Orleans – maybe Chicago; a dark and seedy bar with a big enough stage for a band to make some hellish rock on.  That is the core essence of The Copper Gamins.

Actually, what really gets me is the vibrato that goes into the guitar and complements the southern version of Television, for example. These guys really blew my mind.  I first read their bio and then thought I knew them, but, I must say that listening to the CD did much more for me in terms of learning about them than reading any bio.  It’s a matter of feeling the vibes of the bitchin’ slide guitar, the cool vibrato strumming, the matter-of-fact, sunglass-wearin’ singing that counts the most.   Like most art you can’t appreciate it for real until you actually experience it firsthand and more than just listening to them on CD, I’d love to see them play live and since I live in San Diego, the perfect place around here to see them would be the Casbah – they have the perfect dark, ungentrified and perfectly imperfect set up for them to shine.  It reads that they take a lot of influence from the blues – old, American black blues and it may be true – they do, but they take that influence and twist & turn it into something that is truly their own.  Once in a while, when they hit an emotional note, I’m reminded a bit of Tom Waits at his bluesiest, beeriest moments.  In fact, that would be a good comparison right there:  a cross between Howlin’ Wolf and Tom Waits.  The perfect garage band for the 21st century.  Here’s hoping they’ll be around in the same great form for some time to come and that they’ll hop over to this border town (San Diego) soon!

The Gamins hail from small mining towns Metepec and Zinacantepec (just outside of Mexico City).  They take inspiration from traditional, Southern, black blues that goes back to the inter-war period, deep in the bowels of Dixie.  After their eponymous debut EP, recorded in an abandoned building in Mexico City, the band struck out around town in search of gigs but were not welcomed many places.  Undaunted, the duo kept at it and persevered.  Soon they found themselves on the northern side of the border, playing gigs in San Antonio and Austin, TX.  Their constant live shows and hard work on stage won them a fan base in the southern part of the Lone Star State.  Next thing you know, they’re playing at SXSW, the yearly showcase of new bands that’s built up, up, up from a modest new-artist showcase to a new-artist showcase that is packed with all sorts of corporate scum oozing around, trying to pimp out the “next big thing” for the parasite major labels for whom they work.  But, of course, the ones who take the bait and sell-out like that at least “weed out” the wheat from the chaff and the “wheat” usually goes on to continue to keep on making great music and if they’re lucky, they may get signed to an indie label or meet up with an influential indie who can steer them in the right direction.

Well, for The Copper Gamins, after playing SXSW in 2012, they were signed by Saustex and the rest, as they say, is history.  Since the promising debut EP last year, the Gamins have been driven by J Carmen, who’s been honing his songwriting skills and producing some great stuff, as can be seen on this album.  For those going to this year’s SXSW, look for The Copper Gamins again, to show up and play a set to more and more people who still haven’t caught on quite yet.

It’s hard to really pick out songs here – e.g., tunes that stand out more than others, since they all have that lo-fi, blues-rock with a Latino tinge to it, but just to give you a few examples:  the sexy romp of “Silver Monkey”, the wicked, funky “Angelitos Negros” (Black Angels), the bop-bop-bop-ing around of “Tell My Sister” as well as the howling, plaintive “Hold My Name”.

These guys are really groovy and since they’re just getting started, I say – keep an eye on them, for they definitely still have some of their best stuff yet to come out.

For more information on them and/or to purchase Los Ninos de Cobre, go to www.saustex.com, where you can always see everything Saustex has available as well.

Keep on rocking – KM.

 

Free ad for Hal McGee – Homemade experimental music…

Here is a little info on some interesting and hard-to-find experimental stuff that you can either buy or trade (for other, like-minded stuff) – either cassettes or CD-Rs.  I got this off Facebook but decided to post it here since I’ve reviewed a lot of Stirner’s stuff and he has worked w/Hal and it’s through a post by Tony for a collaboration tape-CD that I found it – hope you like… km.  Also- you can just click on the titles if you want to find out more info about a specific album or go to buy it – click and it goes straight to that album’s info page.

HalTapes Cassette and CD-R List – February 2013

Hal McGee — Homemade Experimental Music since 1982!   Trades are welcome. All cassettes listed below are also available on home-burned CD-Rs, by request. Information on trades, ordering info, and CDRs can be found at the bottom of the list. Click titles for links to info on each cassette. A printed version of this catalog list is available upon request. I make all of my cassettes and CD-Rs on an as-needed as-requested basis. Back Catalog Releases available by request on Cassette or CD-R
2013 Crystal Awareness and Hal McGee: Signal Load Patterns

K.r. Seward and Hal McGee – Standing As Never Before

Ronny Wærnes and Hal McGee – Decisive thoughts by the intermediate flare

Stirner and Hal McGee – micro meanies 2012 Connection Cassette Compilation 7

Moulttrigger and Hal McGee – Moinesville

J. Surak and Hal McGee – Dictators of Lofi

Rafael González and Hal McGee – Code Red

Fiver’s Stereo and Hal McGee – Wormhole Field Guide

Richard Sanderson and Hal McGee – Doubled

Stactor McGee – Banjo Problems

Dave Fuglewicz and Hal McGee – Dead Hand Decision

The Implicit Order and Hal McGee – A Pick-Up Truck and The Devil’s Eyes

Jiblit Dupree and Canned Ham – The Exploitation of Jiblit Dupree

Abortus Fever and Hal McGee – No Title Comes To Mind

Koobaatoo Asparagus and Hal McGee – Saturated World Connection Cassette Compilation 6

Hal McGee – one of a kind tape for everybody

Kathy Burkett and Hal McGee – Fun Daily Activities

Hal McGee – one week in the life of a microcassette

Hal McGee – Hal and Mark visit their friend Dan in Orlando

Lumen Kishkumen and Hal McGee – Falling into the Cosmic Cabinet

Centipede Farmer and Hal McGee – A Series of Lifestyle Circumstances Connection Cassette Compilation 5

Hal McGee – Hal McGee’s Microcassette Variety Hour

Hal McGee – Monotrinity Connection Cassette Compilation 4 Connection Cassette Compilation 3 Jiblit Dupree and Hal McGee …love you Connection Cassette Compilation 2

Hal McGee – Columbus Connection Cassette Compilation 1

Noring/McGee – Cross Contamination

Hal McGee – The Microcassette Diaries

Hal McGee – as lo-fi as i wanna be 2011

Bryan Lewis Saunders and Hal McGee – 30 Cent Walk-In Dewey Broken Back Clinic

Hal McGee and Kris Gruda – Wallay

Hal McGee – Nature Guy

Hal McGee and Koobaatoo Asparagus – Start From Scratch

Anton Mobin and Hal McGee – Damnation For Rent

Tree and Hal McGee – Projected Margins

Dave Fuglewicz and Hal McGee – Synergistic Reconstruction

Hal McGee and Jiblit Dupree – The Stipulator vs. Glow Bell Worming

Hal McGee – My New Tape2003

Goff/McGee – Verve Of The Void 2002

Noring/McGee – Random Sound Generator 2001

Hal McGee – My Intellectual Property 3:  Sedimental Music

Hal McGee – My Intellectual Property 2:  Big Audio Scrap Heap

Hal McGee – My Intellectual Property 3:  Abfall Man 2000

Noring/McGee – New Music for Shortwave Receiver and Tape Recorder

Noring/McGee – Execution/Operation 1998

Noring/McGee – Pursuits Tape Heads Cassette Compilation 6 Tape Heads Cassette Compilation 5 Tape Heads Cassette Compilation 4 Tape Heads Cassette Compilation 3 Tape Heads Cassette Compilation 2 1997

Noring/McGee – Solid State Life

Goff Noring McGee – Cryptomnesia

Herd Of 360 Homogenized Dogs – Summit

360 Sound – Tofu & Tobacco

L.G. Mair and Hal McGee: 6J

Noring/McGee – Sonic Holiday 1996

Noring/McGee – Preoccupations

Hagstrom Hofferber Noring McGee – The Room 1990

Phinney/McGee – Heads 1985

Dog As Master – Brash Pussy
This is a temporary list of what I currently have ready for trade and sale. The emphasis of the current list is recent and new releases. I have produced more than 250 albums since 1982. If you do not see a cassette you are interested in, please inquire. I will do my best to make any title not listed above available, upon request. If you have a special request, please list alternates.
-PLEASE NOTE: My homemade cassettes and CDRs are very plain and simple, but neat. The cassettes come with color inkjet-printed two-panel one-sided j-cards. All CD-Rs come in slimline jewel cases with two-panel cover inserts, and the label on the CD-R is plain white with titles in black.

TRADES – I will trade for your homemade cassette releases (preferred), CD-R releases, and zines. No “demos”, “promos”, or mixtapes. – You can send trades without asking first, but please, no more than four tapes per trade. Double CD-Rs (2 X CD-R) count as two trades. – Non-USA tape traders, because of very high airmail costs I strongly suggest trading 2-3 tapes per exchange to get better postal price value per tape. Example: to mail one tape from USA to an international destination, it costs about $9.50. Each additional item costs about $1.50 extra in postage. – I will not trade for vinyl record releases because I do not own a record player at this time.

SALES Each cassette costs $4.00 (plus postage cost below) – dubbed in real time on Maxell UR-60 or UR-90 Normal Bias cassettes – with title hand-printed on label – color inkjet printed two-panel j-card covers on matte photo paper – Connection compilation covers are color photocopy collage fold-outs
CD-Rs also available upon request for $5.00 each plus postage, or trade All CD-Rs come in slim jewel cases Double CD-Rs (2 X CD-R)  cost $8.00 and count as two items for calculating postage.
Postage USA   1-3 items, $3.00 total postage   add $1.00 for each additional two items Canada   one item, $7.00   each additional item, $1.00 Elsewhere   one item, $9.50   each additional item, $1.50
Payment (in U.S. dollars) – total postage cost + total cost of cassettes = total payment – PayPal to haltapes@gmail.com – U.S. Postal Service money orders and well-hidden U.S. currency sent at your own risk

email Hal McGee
My postal address is:
Hal McGee

4230 SW 20th Lane Apt. F

Gainesville, FL 32607 USA

Hope you buy or trade (for) something – Enjoy!

PS – NOT(!) a paid advertisement!!!! -km

The Mutants are here – among us!

Shaun Robert, et al.

Factor X

Monochrome Vision

Review by Kent Manthie

 

Mutant Beatniks is one of the latest incarnations of a long continuum of experimentalist Shaun Robert, who began creating music around 1979, as sort of a hobby that somehow turned into something bigger than her expected.  By 1983 Factor X was born as a conceptual music project that included noise-drone-avant-garde-experimental stuff.  It began, way back when, on the first one, Robert  used a cassette tape whose shell had been taken apart and lacquered, with globs of black paint which resulted in a mess of grinding, metallic, white noise that would be the result of putting the “altered” tape into a tape deck (he’d be lucky if the tape deck wasn’t ruined first) that was the genesis of Factor X.  This resulted in a series of like-minded cassette experimentations.   The second Factor X experiment was entitled “E.T.A.” (Experimental Tape Art), originally recorded in what turned out to be “lopsided stereo”, which he subsequently redid by recording onto a mono format.

Since then, a lot of different like-minded tapes were released on various indie labels, like Drahtfunk Products, Jeremy Bander Tapes, SPH and Bandaged Hand Produce.

A collaborative CD was released with TAC and Runzelstirn & Gurgelstock by Harsh Dept. back in the mid-80s.

In the mid-1990s it had been quiet for quite a while when Shaun decided to get things going again and came back with new ideas and projects, including Mutant Beatniks, et al.

Anyway, Robert felt, in recent times that it would be a great idea to revisit some of the older stuff he had done back in the 80s and re-introduce it to the public.  Thus, this CD, Factor X was born.

This is a sampling of some of Robert’s early inventive experiments with sound that he was into back in the day and included some stuff like using two different tape decks, each playing different things and a third deck which was used to record the cacophonous experiment.  Pretty crude stuff – even for back then, but still, quite imaginative.  Just the iconoclastic thinking and work that was put into these recordings make them quite enjoyable – there are not only strange clanking, metal machine noises but also samplings of what sound like vocal radio transmissions, South Asian singing over percussive things but also lots of other practically indescribable stuff – except to say “c’est tres avant-garde” which is, nowadays, somewhat trite and sometimes overused, but in this case, is right on the money.  It is definitely iconoclastic, unique and one person’s vision that foreshadowed a lot of the current underground noise-drone style outfits out there, especially those on various netlabels and on DIY, make-’em-yourself CDs, etc.

I really dig it all, it’s really hard to single out any particular track to say I like it more than another or to highlight one or two at the expense of the others – instead, I’d say that it’s best to listen to the whole CD in one session of listening to “get” what’s going on.  The last track is a very interesting one, a little more “modern”-seeming than the rest, featuring a lot of samples of female voices speaking (announcements?  warnings?  advertisements?) juxtaposed over industrial sturm und drang; “sludge”.

Also, right now, one can get a glimpse of another Shaun Robert project – the infamous Mutant Beatniks, who you can find all over Facebook, at least if you know where to look.

For more information, including how to get this stuff and other info, one is directed to the Monochrome Vision website:  www.monochromevision.rv  It is, especially for the times, even a little more “industrial” than Throbbing Gristle and maybe even more so than Whitehouse… the latter for sure, but then again, Whitehouse was pretty noisy and nihilistic.  But anyway, check out Mutant Beatniks on Facebook to find out more about them and the phenomenon that surrounds them and, while you’re at it, look up Shaun Robert, since he’s ever-changing and has a lot of stuff going on, which will be covered, as time goes on.  I, myself, actually wish that I was more of a wild, experimental, indie freak instead of the metal-head (in 7th grade) and then “acid” or psychedelic rocker after 1985, I would’ve been able to “be there…now” back then.  Know what I mean?  But as things go, I’m now into many varieties of music (except for country and bubble gum top 40 garbage, like Britney Spears and all those other worthless here today-gone tomorrow acts whose names I don’t even know, except for that pussy Justin Bieber-I keep telling myself “don’t worry,  he’ll be nothing but a forgotten bum in a few years…)  – But for now, keep the indie-underground scene rolling right along and keep those dirty corporate hands off them!!!  -KM

 

Cut-Up #2

CUM SOCK/EGO DEATH – together!!

Cum sock/Ego Death Split CD

Fight ‘Til You Die

Sewer Records

Review by Kent Manthie

 

So – we have another split CD featuring the world famous Cum Sock, with 30 blazing, super-fast speed-metal tracks and six tunes by noise merchants, Ego Death.  This time, the blitz comes to you from your friends at Sewer Records (thanks!)…

Now, as I mentioned, the first 30 songs on the disc are all by grindcore band Cum Sock – each one averages out at about a minute long – some are as short as 25 seconds, others, as long as 1:11.  These quick ditties each have a little something to say about different political themes, such as jerking off in the shower (not in MY shower, don’t you do it in MY shower!), how a certain someone needs a “punch in the face”, getting some skin, Asian fetishes and a spoken word rant about how lame “Emo” is and that the phonies who go to the shows are not at all “punk rock”.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a track listing, so I don’t know the names of any of the tunes, but I’d say, check out tracks 18, 19 and, for a cool instrumental, #26.  Also, song, #29 is pretty funny – another spoken word song talking about working at some place and asking some guy who turned out to be a Muslim if he liked Britney Spears and how he (the narrator) went and had a big breakfast the next morning and then on Monday the Muslim guy never came back to work.  It’s funnier when you hear it – but that seems to be the point of much of Cum Sock’s work – it has a dark, crazy, twisted – but funny – sense of humor that sets them apart from a lot of their peers, who just make up stuff that’s either unintelligible, right-wing nonsense or death-metal.

Then, when you get to Ego Death’s contributions, the last six tunes, it’s a different story:  right away you can hear the difference – Ego Death is no-nonsense, no singing, no melody, no harmony, just straight up NOISE – they do get pretty inventive – using mostly guitars in a way that’s quite unorthodox to create the piercing, metallic, structure-free ambient noise.  E.D.’s songs are a bit longer than Cum Sock’s – well, the first two are both 1:41, but the other four are seven minutes, six minutes, four minutes and nine minutes, respectively.  It does have a dream/nightmare soundscape in there.  The cacophony is atmospheric and somewhat textured, which is a bit like the most bizarre visual collage you could ever conceive.

Anyway, according to the accompanying CD sleeve, you can get in touch/find out more about each band on MySpace – ok, yeah, this one’s kind of been around a while – it was originally recorded in 2007  – but with the downward spiral of MySpace and the rise of Facebook, I’d be willing to wager (if they’re still around) that you could find out how to contact them on FB.   Failing that, I’d say do a Google search for each band.

Enjoy!!!                       –KM